Senate approves plan to push back primary

Wednesday

Feb 24, 2010 at 12:01 AMFeb 24, 2010 at 12:20 AM

State lawmakers are moving ahead with plans to push back the early February primary to a later date. A Senate committee voted Wednesday without opposition for Senate Bill 355, which would push back the primary to the third week of March.

Matt Hopf

State lawmakers are moving ahead with plans to push back the early February primary to a later date.

The Senate voted Wednesday without opposition for Senate Bill 355, which would push back the primary to the third week of March. That's where it was traditionally held before it was moved up to early February in 2007 to help then-presidential candidate Barack Obama.

Sen. Deanna Demuzio, a Carlinville Democrat sponsoring the legislation, said voters were accustomed to the date the primaries were held since the 1970s.

Testifying with Demuzio was Montgomery County Clerk Sandy Leitheiser, who spoke about the difficulty of assembling more than 200 election judges in February.

She said some election judges spent the winter in the South and were not back in February, but would be back in time for the March primary.

Turnout was another reason Leitheiser wanted the date pushed back, with 29.6 percent of registered voters heading to the polls.

"I consider that turnout very disappointing," she said, adding it was inflated because of a school district property tax increase referendum.

Some committee members suggested pushing it back further.

"I think April or May would be the appropriate time," said Sen. John Jones, R-Mount Vernon. "All my county clerks are saying to move it to April or May."

Demuzio said she would be open to a later date.

On Tuesday, the House advanced a similar measure pushing the primary date back to March.